People who miss their BECMI boxes will probably be satisfied with the RC. People who miss their 1981 Moldvay-Cook Basic and Expert boxes will be better served by Basic Fantasy RPG. I own a hardcover of the RC and consult it occasionally for reference. It's just a lot more detail than I'm looking for.

Good video. I agree that it all comes down to preferences. I prefer Basic Fantasy over Rules Cyclopedia (I have both) because, for me, less is more. Here are some of the reasons I like Basic Fantasy better: • Price. • Smaller size, more condensed. This is a feature, not a bug, to me. • More generous thief skill percentages. • No race as class. I prefer them to be separate. • I prefer fewer classes and player options. • Only humans get prime requisite bonuses to xp. I think this gives humans a chance to compete against demi-human abilities. • Spells are better defined and more explicit in Basic Fantasy (imo). • Magic-users get Read Magic automatically and don’t need to memorize it (still uses a spell slot though). • Energy drain is more elegant (imo). • Most of the extras Rules Cyclopedia has (monsters, classes, equipment, etc.) can be gotten for free for Basic Fantasy. True, it’s not all in one book, but I like decide what to include and what not to.

That's a pretty fair and concise overview. The great thing about old school and retro clones is that you can mix and match stuff .

Oh yeah! Great video! Would love a comparison between the Rules Cyclopedia and its retroclone Dark Dungeons PS: later versions of Dark Dungeons (Darker Dungeons and Dark Dungeons X) contain more homebrew from the authors but look pretty good as well PSS: Dark Dungeons (any version) is like BFRPG: Free PDF and at cost PoD

Love this video - great summary of both and I love this whole series, my start in the hobby was the Mentzer Red Basic box. RC is an amazing recapitulated and edition mix of the boxed sets but has its flaws - it expects its readers to have had experience with the BECMI D&D boxed set - whereas BFRPG takes readers through from knowing nothing to developing a complete game. I'm not making this point to say one is better than the other - just that they were written for different audiences at different times. There are supplements that provide skills. But yeah - the Core Rules are self-contained by design so any extras you may need to possibly match the extensive RC rules and they come from Supplements. One important one is the Equipment Emporium. Anyway 4th edition of BFRPG was to 'de-OGL-ify' the rules and has minimal changes and adds in a few more monsters. One plus the RC has is its resiliency to handling campaigns at length using printed adventures in a series - there are clear rules in it to take characters up above level 20 whereas BFRPG caps out at level 20. Not that this is very important - you can do campaigns with BFRPG of course - but I think the RC has a bigger framework as a base. I think your points on settings gloss over the FACT that Chris has repeated many times he doesn't want a 'default setting' to arise for BFRPG - encouraging GMs to make their own - a lot of RC's setting info has its legacy from previously published content. And the fact that BEMI D&D is amazing at being able to convert to AD&D/2e AD&D.

Great way to compare the two books. I’m sure Basic Fantasy would rank a bit better if you included the supplements.

Great job, Bro! Couldn't agree more!! 🤓👊

Basic Fantasy VS Old School Esentials?

Great stuff! I'm a big fan of BECMI. Two watch outs. If you're coming from Red Box Basic, you already have a fix for this, but you might noticed some weirdness in the RC combat procedures. They seem to skip the declaration step, which causes isses with magic and other things. This is a total guess, but this error seems to have snuck in with the AC2 DM screen. It was also carried into the D&D Classic starter box from the 90s. Red box had it correct so if you came in with background knowledge it wasn't a big deal. The other thing is movement in combat. I think pg142 and 143 (sorry not near my book). These pages contradict each other. BECMI Beserker touched on this in one of his combat video. OSE (Old School Essentials) Classic clarified both of these issues. Obviously neither of these are big deals, but I found them confusing initially so I thought it worth pointing out

OSRIC is free.

As always, this is great stuff. I have both, and the RC was something I picked up to use with BFRPG (at the recommendation of The Basic Expert). It's a great book, but I never actually played B/X. We started straight on AD&D 2e (badly I'm sure) and so this was something I grabbed when I was just starting back in. I've grabbed lots of books over the past year and I've learned a ton about different game systems and styles. I actually don't play either game currently but I love them both. I totally agree about BFRPG being the highlights vs the RC.

The Rules Cyclopedia is unbeaten as the best all in one book game. That's not a knock on anything else, DCC is my favorite system. As fantastic as the DCC book is, it's nowhere near as complete as the RC.